The Cost of Knowing, page 10
And she’s gone.
6 The Bedroom
BY THE TIME I get through the visions of the baking tray, the oven door, the oven light button, the oven door again, a pizza bite, and finally, the knob to turn the oven off, Isaiah is asleep on the living room sofa.
Here I am with a tray of a hundred pizza bites, and no appetite.
I set the tray down on the sofa, pick up my phone, cancel the vision of me unlocking it, and unlock it.
No texts.
I breathe a huge sigh and lean my head back against the sofa. Man, I’ve fucked up. Who knows what Talia thinks of me? Probably that I’m a coward. Probably that I’m self-conscious about my body or something and that’s why I’m not ready when, admittedly, I am. I’m so ready. I dream about her sometimes. Picture her naked. I’ve seen her in a swimsuit so many times that I have enough material for my imagination to fill in the rest.
I glance across the room at Isaiah and consider leaving him here while I go to my room to masturbate. I need to relax. My head hurts. My chest hurts. I’m tired.
But then I realize that Isaiah still isn’t safe, even in sleep. What if he has a nightmare and rolls off the sofa and snaps his neck? I look at the pizza bites. What if he wakes up while I’m away and eats one and chokes? Maybe I should wake him up? We only have a couple of days at most to figure out where this curse came from and get rid of it, and here he is, sleeping it all away! But I glance at him again. His face is completely relaxed, his mouth slightly open as his chest rises and falls. And I sigh.
How can I wake him up when he looks so… at peace? He’s probably dreaming about… I don’t know… Lucky Charms and pizza bites. Or BeatBall. Or maybe he’s hanging out with Mom and Dad. Maybe he’s finally happy.
I should let him sleep. But I should stay in here, at least until he wakes up, just to make sure he doesn’t stop breathing or something. Besides, sleeping off a headache is sometimes as effective as fapping it away. I slide the pizza bites to the other side of the sofa, curl up in my corner, rest my head on the armrest, and shut my eyes.
I dream of Talia in that black dress, smiling at me in the moonlight, pulling me up a hill. The night air is cool against my skin, and she looks over her shoulder at me and mouths the words “Kiss me.” And then the sky flashes white. Thunder explodes, chasing the lightning, and rain hisses down in sheets, soaking both of us. Her hair is black against her forehead, cheeks, neck, and shoulders, and her face is contorted into a grimace. And suddenly we’re standing in a glowing yellow haze, with headlights creeping alongside us. She turns to face me.
“Why?!” she shrieks in the darkness. “Why didn’t you tell me?!”
She falls to her knees, clawing at the sidewalk, boring all the way through the concrete, her fingers bloody, her fingernails gone. She reaches wet earth and hurls globs of grass and soil at me. I hold up my hands for her to stop, and I try to speak, but my throat is blocked with something. She keeps digging at the earth, throwing chunk after chunk, and when I look back, there’s a perfectly rectangular hole in front of her.
“I’m sorry,” I mouth to her. She stops mid-throw, each fist full of mud and grass and blood, and looks down into the hole. Curious, I follow her gaze, stepping forward until I can see the casket at the bottom. I read my name.
Alex Rufus, dearly beloved.
What the hell?!
I fall backward, my body slamming into the ground, clutching at my chest, looking down at my caramel-colored hands. I turn them over and over again. And then Talia says his name.
“Shaun.”
I look up at her, confusion and fear ripping through me like a hurricane. The rain is running into my eyes, and I can barely see her silhouette as she continues, “Why didn’t you tell me?”
I end up being the one who tumbles off the side of the couch, my foot catching the corner of the pizza bite tray and sending it flying across the floor, crumbs and all.
Fuck.
I lay on the carpet, staring at the ceiling, heart pounding. I smell sweet potatoes. I hear Isaiah’s laugh. Oh thank God, he’s okay. And that’s when I notice, the tray that used to be covered in pizza bites, the one that now sits overturned on the floor, was all crumbs.
Did… did Isaiah eat them all?
“Whoa, dude,” he giggles, picking up the tray from the floor. I see his impish face over me, all smiles. I haven’t seen him smile like that in years, and relief flows through me like medicine.
“Isaiah,” I begin, clearing my throat, which is still raspy from sleep. “What time is it?”
“Dinnertime. Aunt Mackie’s home. Mrs. Zaccari’s here.”
Mrs. Zaccari’s here?
I look up and around at the living room and hear the faint sound of talking coming from the kitchen. Suddenly a shrill explosion of two women’s laughter cuts the otherwise almost silence, and I jump.
“Told you,” says Isaiah. He kneels and scoops the crumbs from the carpet into his hands. “You didn’t predict that she’d come over?”
“Shh,” I say. “Isaiah, that’s between you and me, okay? You better not tell anyone.”
“Okay, fine,” he says. “Don’t tell anyone about mine, either.”
I nod. “Of course. I won’t.”
I would never.
Aunt Mackie’s voice rings out from the kitchen.
“Boys, what was that sound?”
“Nothing!” hollers Isaiah.
He and I both know we’re not supposed to bring food into the living room. The tray is back on the sofa, and most of the crumbs are in Isaiah’s hands, being dusted off onto the tray.
“Thanks, man,” I say, and then I think of something. “Did you eat all those pizza bites?”
He picks up the tray, looks at me, and shrugs.
“You judgin’?” he asks.
I smile. That’s the title of another single from The Rush.
“Nah,” I say.
“Good,” he says, hurrying across the living room to the kitchen. “ ’Cause I’m still hungry.”
I shake my head with a smile. And then I remember our mission.
“Hey,” I say, reaching out to touch his shoulder, and then recoiling when I remember my power. I clear my throat as he turns to face me. “Uh… after dinner, I really think we should go figure out how to get rid of this”—I gesture between me and him—“this thing we’ve got.”
He giggles.
“It’s not a disease, you know,” he says.
“Sure feels like it sometimes.”
“Definitely still feels like a curse.”
“About that word… ‘curse,’ ” I whisper as he starts walking again. “Come on, it’s not all bad, is it? You get to see all the stuff in our history played out like a movie.”
“And you get to see the future like a movie,” he says. “I’ll bet neither is all bad. But it’s not all great, either.”
“A little of both?” I ask.
After a moment of staring at the floor, he looks up at me and nods determinedly.
When I follow Isaiah into the kitchen, Aunt Mackie and Mrs. Zaccari are sitting at the island bar, each with a glass of white wine almost as big as half a bottle. Aunt Mackie gives me a brief smile before directing her attention to Isaiah.
“Did you have that tray in your room?” she asks as Isaiah slips it into the deep sink with a clang!
“Yup,” he says casually. His voice is lighter and brighter than it usually is around Aunt Mackie. Then I put it together. He’s trying to sound cheery because we have a guest over. A guest who might just pay him to mow her lawn soon.
“Hi, Mrs. Zaccari,” he chirps, smiling big.
Mrs. Zaccari looks much more awake now that she’s out of her satin robe and into pressed white pants and a blue-and-white-striped top like she’s on vacation. She’s washed and blow-dried her hair so that it falls in gold and silver waves over one shoulder.
“Hi, Isaiah,” she says, beaming, her smile pearly white and her eyes warm. “Hi, Alex. Looks like you boys were tired. When I got here, you were fast asleep on the couch.”
“Yeah,” says Isaiah. “Sleeping and eating are what I’m best at. And mowing lawns.”
Oh God, the pandering. I roll my eyes and cringe internally, but Mrs. Zaccari just chuckles and takes a swig of wine. Aunt Mackie is pursing her lips at Isaiah with that boy, if you don’t stop look of hers. She knows his game. I’m sure Mrs. Zaccari knows it too, but she’s playing along great. I smile at both of them. Mrs. Zaccari speaks next.
“I think I saw chicken salad in the fridge. Right, MacKayla?”
Aunt Mackie nods and sips from her wineglass.
“There’s chicken salad, roasted sweet potatoes, and mandarin oranges. They’re already packed in individual lunch containers, but help yourself.”
A bit of the light leaves Isaiah’s eyes at the news of chicken salad, roasted sweet potatoes, and mandarin oranges. I already know what he’s thinking: None of that is fried. None of that is especially high in sugar. None of that is tasty.
“Ah, on second thought, I’m okay,” he says.
“If you’re hiding Lucky Charms in your room, I will find them,” says Aunt Mackie.
Normally, I’d be making my oh shiiiit face snidely at Isaiah, relishing him finally getting caught for hoarding all those sticky, marshmallowy boxes of cereal in his room. But I look at him now, with his hands in his pockets, staring at Aunt Mackie with a stone face even though he knows several boxes are back in his room, and I think to myself, Let him have them.
He’s only got a little time left. Let him have them. Let him have every last little thing that makes him happy.
“Bring them here,” says Aunt Mackie. Her words are blending together a bit, and she’s probably a little extra agitated now that she’s had wine. I’ve tried it before. It’s bitter and miserable and I’d be agitated if I had half a bottle of it in me, too.
Isaiah’s shoulders slump forward and he lifts his face in a grimace.
“Aunt Mackie, come on,” he says.
“Nah-ah-ah,” says Aunt Mackie, pointing down the hall. “Go. I’ll have no contraband in my house.”
Isaiah turns and slumps out of the room, disappearing down the hallway, and my anxiety shoots through the roof now that he’s out of sight. What if he trips on the rug in the hallway and goes flying into a doorjamb? What if there’s a loose wire somewhere in his room and one of the dozens of half-empty disposable water bottles decides to spring a leak too close to the wire? What if—
“Sweet kid,” says Mrs. Zaccari, nudging Aunt Mackie playfully and taking another sip of wine. “You must be so proud. They’re both so smart.”
Mrs. Zaccari smiles up at me, wrinkling her nose a bit as she does.
Aunt Mackie’s smirk melts into a smile and an eye roll.
I watch Mrs. Zaccari’s smile fall slightly.
“Actually”—she clears her throat—“they’re part of the reason I want to get this petition moving before tomorrow night.”
Aunt Mackie lets out a huge sigh and reaches for the wine bottle, even though there’s a whole two inches of wine left in her glass. The wine glug, glug, glugs into her glass as Mrs. Zaccari leans forward on the counter and prepares to keep talking.
I glance at the door and hope Isaiah didn’t fall and hit his head on the desk or choke on a piece of gum I didn’t know he was chewing or—
I take my first step in making a break for it before Mrs. Zaccari stops me cold.
“Alex, could you stay for a sec? I really want your opinion on this.”
Shit.
“I want to make sure all our kids are safe,” she continues. “There’s so much crap out there in the world, MacKayla, outside Santiam. They’re having this event in our backyard tomorrow night. That doesn’t scare you at all?”
She says “they’re” as if she’s not referring to the worshippers of the king himself. The fire-breathing wizard of rap. The Black Dragon.
She looks up at me as if she can hear my thoughts.
“Alex, back me up here on this, please. You’re a sensible kid with internet access. Don’t you feel the least bit uneasy about them having a Shiv Skeptic concert a mile away?”
No. Not even a little.
Mrs. Zaccari has no idea of the concert footage I’ve seen—the pills I’ve seen passed from pocket to pocket, the elixirs hidden inside water bottles and flasks and even squeaky toys—yes, I saw someone do that once, with a rubber ducky the size of my fist. The woman whose front lawn I mow every other week has no idea who I am or what I dream about, and I guess in the name of professionalism, she probably never should.
“Uneasy?” I ask coyly. That’s it, Alex, I think, play coy.
“Uneasy,” repeats Mrs. Zaccari. Aunt Mackie is already halfway through downing her wine refill. “Maybe even a little scared?”
I know what she’s doing. She’s trying to bait me into ganging up on Aunt Mackie about this. She wants me to help pressure my aunt into signing the petition and pushing it forward so she can get this concert canceled.
“I try not to be afraid of anything, Mrs. Zaccari,” I say, being as diplomatic as possible. “But I understand your concerns about having it so close.”
Aunt Mackie picks up on my apprehension and lowers her glass to the counter, looking from me to Mrs. Zaccari.
“I think you may be overreacting a bit, Karen,” she says, leaning forward on one elbow. “Shiv Skeptic is one of the biggest artists in the world right now. You don’t think they’ll have ample security and metal detectors there? You don’t think they’ll be checking tickets and IDs at the door?”
“I’m not worried about security at the event, MacKayla,” says Mrs. Zaccari with a tone that says my aunt grossly misunderstood her point. “I’m worried about security after the event, when all those drunk, high, strung-out people come back to the homes they might have rented for the weekend, many of which could be right here in Santiam Estates. I just think the homeowners association could use a vetting process for out-of-towners, especially when events like this come around.”
I really want to ask her what she means by events like this, but Aunt Mackie is speaking again.
“What kind of vetting process, Karen?” she asks with a sigh. Mrs. Zaccari might not know my aunt well enough to realize how tired she is of this conversation.
Mrs. Zaccari swirls her wine and glances up at me before answering.
“Background checks would be a great start,” she says.
“So we’d bar anyone with a record from renting a house here?”
“Does keeping convicted felons out of our homes sound unreasonable to you?”
I hear Isaiah’s footsteps racing back down the hall to us, and he leaps into the kitchen with a four-foot slide across the wood floor in his socks. It happens so fast. He reaches out to catch himself before sliding into the corner of the island. His feet fly out from under him, and he lands flat on the hardwood with an “Oogh!” that sounds like it’s been forced from somewhere deep within his gut.
Shit! It’s happened. This is it. I knew I should’ve followed him down the hall!
“Isaiah, oh my God!” cries Aunt Mackie. She’s off the barstool and around the side of the island so fast she almost knocks her wineglass over. Mrs. Zaccari stands and races around the other side of the island past me, almost knocking into me. They both kneel over my little brother, whose hands are resting on his stomach. He coughs, coughs again, and then, to my surprise, he laughs, again.
And he doesn’t stop.
His face is looking up at the ceiling, mouth open, eyes shut tight as he cackles and clutches his stomach.
“Isaiah John, what the hell?” snaps Aunt Mackie. She’s made the leap from flustered bystander to exasperated guardian in less than a second, but all I feel is relief. Clearly Mrs. Zaccari feels the same, because she reaches out and tickles more laughs out of him.
“You have to be more careful, goofball!” she laughs.
“This isn’t funny,” says Aunt Mackie, rising back to her feet and resting her hand on her forehead. “Don’t run in the house again. And where are those Lucky Charms you were supposed to come back with?”
I realize just how light-headed all this is making me. The vision of Isaiah. The knowing it’s happening, only for it not to. That’s how my visions work. Much like my anxiety. I grab the back of the only unoccupied barstool, cancel the vision of me sitting down in it, and sit down in it just as Isaiah’s laughter dwindles enough for him to speak.
“I recycled them,” he says with a grin.
“I don’t believe you,” says Aunt Mackie.
“It’s true!” he insists, rolling onto his side and pushing himself to his feet. “Look in the recycle bin. There’s four empty boxes in there.”
“You had four boxes of Lucky Charms in your room, Isaiah?” asks Mrs. Zaccari.
“They’re good!” explains Isaiah.
Mrs. Zaccari laughs. “I know they’re good. My husband eats them every once in a while, but four boxes? How long did it take you to get through those?”
“I haven’t been keeping track,” says Isaiah, his grin suddenly sheepish.
Mrs. Zaccari and Aunt Mackie look at each other, Mrs. Zaccari with that scrunched-nose smile of hers, and Aunt Mackie with another eye roll. Suddenly it hits me. Hard. I realize that in just a few days, those smiles will be gone. Isaiah will be gone. Aunt Mackie and Mrs. Zaccari will never hear his laugh again. And here I am just watching in silence. My brain knows telling them would just make it worse, but I wonder if I did, and they miraculously believed me, if they’d do anything differently. If they’d let him eat as much sugar as he wants. If they’d let him listen to whatever music makes him happy.
If they’d help me figure out how to get rid of this.
We have to get rid of this.
I have to get rid of this.
For him.
“Well, I guess we’d better let you two get back to your conversation,” I say, shuffling toward Isaiah. “Wouldn’t want us kids to get in your way. Come on, Isaiah, let’s go—”
